10 Important Things About the Planet Mercury

The first important thing about planet Mercury is the one closest to the Sun. Find out about 10 important things about the planet Mercury with help from an educational professional in this free video clip.

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Video Transcript

Hi, my name is Eylene Pirez and I'm an astrophysicist. And this is 10 important things about the planet Mercury. So, the first important thing about planet Mercury is the one closest to the Sun. The second thing is that this is the smallest in size. Now, the third thing is that it has orbital speed that is very fast and that means that it complete revolutions around the Sun very quickly. The next thing is that even though that it's revolving around its Sun really fast it's spinning around itself very slowly. So, it has a very slow rotational period. Now because of this slow rotationary period, it can actually get really cold and really hot. Most people think because it's closest to the Sun, it's always very hot. But it can actually get 200, minus 200 degrees Fahrenheit in the surface of Mercury. So, actually have extreme temperatures. Now the other thing is that it doesn't really have an atmosphere, it has something called an exosphere. Which means that it doesn't have enough gravitational pull to keep the gases near the surface. But it only, you can find a little bit of traces of gases. But it's not dense enough to be called an atmosphere. So, exosphere. The next thing, it actually is the second densest plant on the solar system. Because most of its body is made by its core and the core is made out of iron and nickel. So, it's a very dense planet. And only recently they found out that the core might actually not be completely dead. Generally if the core has solidified throughout, there's no longer any activity in the planet, it's considered a dead planet. But it actually has been thought to actually still have some movement. So, active core. The next thing is that Mercury also has a lot of signs of bombardment, which means it has had a lot of impacts and collisions with different celestial bodies. So, I will call that impacts. And then, the next thing is that the surface is wrinkled and it's because the planet and cooled and contracted. So the outer surface has kind of like formed wrinkles and ridges. So, it actually has deformed the landform. So a wrinkled surface. And these are 10 important facts about the planet Mercury that people should know. My name is Eylene Pirez and I'm an astrophysicist. And this important facts about Mercury.